After Silence: A History of AIDS through Its Images

by Avram Finkelstein

Overview

Early in the 1980s AIDS epidemic, six gay activists created one of the most iconic and lasting images that would come to symbolize a movement: a protest poster of a pink triangle with the words “Silence = Death.” The graphic and the slogan still resonate today, often used—and misused—to brand the entire movement. Cofounder of the collective Silence = Death and member of the art collective Gran Fury, Avram Finkelstein tells the story of how his work and other protest artwork associated with the early years of the pandemic were created. In writing about art and AIDS activism, the formation of collectives, and the political process, Finkelstein reveals a different side of the traditional HIV/AIDS history, told twenty-five years later, and offers a creative toolbox for those who want to learn how to save lives through activism and making art.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780520351332
Publisher:	University of California Press
Publication date:	06/30/2020
Edition description:	First Edition
Pages:	248
Sales rank:	1,139,945
Product dimensions:	6.00(w) x 8.00(h) x 0.80(d)

About the Author

Avram Finkelstein is a founding member of the Silence = Death and Gran Fury collectives. His work is in the permanent collections of the Museum of Modern Art, the Whitney Museum, the New Museum, and the Smithsonian Archives of American Art.

Table of Contents

List of Illustrations
Preface
Acknowledgments
Author’s Note

Introduction: AIDS 2.0

PART I. SILENCE = DEATH

1. The Immigrant
2. The Political Poster
3. War

PART II. GRAN FURY

4. Read My Lips
5. Kissing Doesn’t Kill
6. Art Is Not Enough

PART III. AFFINITY

7. Men: Use Condoms or Beat It
8. Women Don’t Get AIDS, They Just Die from It
9. The Four Questions, Part 1: The Viral Divide
10. The Four Questions, Part 2: Intergenerationality
Epilogue: Notstalgia

Index

What People are Saying About This

"This is some of the best writing about AIDS activism that I have ever read."

Larry Kramer

"This is some of the best writing about AIDS activism that I have ever read."

Editorial Reviews

"Finkelstein makes sure to emphasise the partiality of his story, while offering an admirably detailed and carefully drawn picture of the many affinities that made his story to stick out."

Gesnerus

"While there is no equation for writing history, this generous and generative book will inspire artists, activists, and historians to do the math themselves."

Critical Inquiry

"Finkelstein's life of activism and creativity is hugely impressive, and this book is a perfect reflection of that. It is emotionally and intellectually engaging at once, never losing sight of the political history the author is recounting."

Gay and Lesbian Review

"This is some of the best writing about AIDS activism that I have ever read."

Larry Kramer

"...what in another writer’s hands might have been a dry academic treatise turns out to be a lively ramble through high and low culture, touching on the likes of Diderot, Goethe, David Foster Wallace, Susan Sontag, Sleeping Beauty, the Countess de Castiglione and Andy Warhol."

Wall Street Journal